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REPORTABLE
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CRIMINAL APPELLATE JURISDICTION
CRIMINAL APPEAL NO. 1168 OF 2014
[ Arising out of SLP (Crl.) No.5529 OF 2011]

Mosiruddin Munshi
Appellant(s)

versus

Md. Siraj and another

Respondent(s)

JUDGMENT
C. NAGAPPAN, J.

1.

Leave granted.

CRMP No.12896 of 2011 seeking

impleadment as a party is dismissed.

2.

This appeal is preferred against order dated June 29,

2010, passed by the High Court of Calcutta in CRR No.1978

of 2006 in FIR No.251 dated 10.11.2005 on the file of
Amherst Street Police Station registered for the alleged
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offences under Section 420/120B IPC including the order

dated 28.10.2005 in case No.C/949 of 2005 passed by the
Additional Metropolitan Magistrate, Calcutta.

3.

Briefly the facts are as follows :

The appellant

herein/ complainant was looking for a plot of land for

construction of residential house in January 2005 and
accused No.2, Masud Alam, a public servant represented
that he could arrange for the said plot and introduced the
appellant to respondent No.1/accused No.1 who stated that
he had a plot of land and the appellant believing the
representation made by the accused No.2 entered into an
agreement for sale with respondent No.1 herein/accused
No.1 and also paid a sum of Rs.5,00,001/- in

cash. The

respondent No.1 herein refused to hand over the necessary

title documents to the appellant which led to issuance of
legal notice by the appellant. All other methods to compel
respondent No.1 to complete the sale having failed the
appellant

filed a complaint on 28.10.2005 in the Court of

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Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Calcutta against

respondent No.1 herein/accused No.1 and accused No.2 for
the offences punishable under Section 420, read with
Section 120B of the IPC. The Additional Chief Metropolitan
Magistrate forwarded the complaint to the officer in-charge
of the

Amherst Street

Police Station for

causing

investigation under Section 156(3) of Criminal Procedure

Code by treating the complaint as First Information Report.
Respondent No.1 herein/accused No.1 filed application
under

Section

482

of

Cr.PC

proceedings including the FIR.

for

quashing

the

said

Though the appellant

herein/complainant was impleaded as a party no attempt

was made to serve notice on him with the result that the
learned single Judge of the High Court quashed the
complaint proceedings in the absence of the appellant
herein.

Challenging the said order the appellant herein

preferred appeal to this Court in Criminal Appeal No.852 of

2008 and this Court by judgment dated May 09, 2008
allowed the appeal and remitted the case to the High Court

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for a fresh decision in accordance with law. Thereafter the

High Court heard both the parties and by impugned order
dated June, 29, 2010 allowed the

application under

Section 482 Cr.P.C and quashed the complaint proceedings.

Aggrieved by the same the complainant has preferred the
present appeal.

4.

The learned counsel for the appellant contended

that the contents of the complaint

would disclose the

commission of the cognizable offences alleged and the

High Court at the preliminary stage would not be justified
in

embarking

upon

an

inquiry

and

quashing

the

proceedings and hence the impugned order is liable to be

set aside.

Per contra the learned counsel for the

Respondent No.1/accused No.1 contended that the dispute

involved in the complaint is of civil nature and none of the
acts allegedly committed by the Respondent No.1 gave rise
to any criminal liability as rightly held by the High Court. In
support of the submission he relied on the following

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decisions of this Court in Hridaya Ranjan Prasad Verma

and others Vs. State of Bihar and another (2000) 4 SCC

168, Murari Lal Gupta Vs. Gopi Singh (2005) 13 SCC 699
and

Ram Biraji Devi and another Vs. Umesh Kumar

Singh and another (2006) 6 SCC 669.

5.

The legal position with regard to exercise of

jurisdiction by the High Court for quashing the First

Information Report is now well settled. It is not necessary
for us to delve deep thereinto as the propositions of law
have been stated by this Court in R. Kalyani Vs. Janak C.
Mehta (2009) 1 SCC 516 in the following terms :

15. Propositions of law which emerge from the said

decisions are :

(1) The High Court ordinarily would not

exercise its inherent jurisdiction to
quash a criminal proceeding and, in
particular, a first information report
unless the allegations contained
therein, even if given face value and
taken to be correct in their entirety,
disclosed no cognizable offence.
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(2) For the said purpose the Court,

save and except in very exceptional
circumstances, would not look to any
document relied upon by the
defence.

(3)
Such a power should be exercised
very sparingly. If the allegations
made in the FIR disclose commission
of an offence, the Court shall not go
beyond the same and pass an order
in favour of the accused to hold
absence of any mens rea or actus
reus.

(4) If the allegation discloses a civil

dispute, the same by itself may not
be a ground to hold that the criminal
proceedings should not be allowed to
continue.

6.

Yet again in Mahesh Chaudhary Vs. State of

Rajasthan (2009) 4 SCC 443) this Court stated the law

thus :
11.
The
principle
providing
for
exercise of the power by a High Court
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under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal

Procedure to quash a criminal proceeding
is well known. The Court shall ordinarily
exercise the said jurisdiction, inter alia, in
the event the allegations contained in the
FIR or the complaint petition even if on
face value are taken to be correct in their
entirety, does not disclose commission of
an offence.

7.

In the present case the complaint does make

averments so as to infer fraudulent or dishonest

inducement having been made by Respondent No.1
herein and accused No.2 pursuant to which the appellant
parted with money. It is the case of the appellant that
Respondent No.2 does not have title over the property
since the settlement deed was not a registered one and
Respondent No.1 herein and accused No.2 had entered
into criminal conspiracy and they fraudulently induced
the appellant to deliver a sum of Rs.5,00,001/- with no
intention to complete the sale deal. The averments in
the complaint would prima facie make out a case for
investigation by the authority.

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8.

In the decisions relied on by the learned counsel for

the respondent No.1, cited supra, this Court on the facts

therein held that the allegations in the complaint read as
a whole prima facie did not disclose commission of
offences alleged and quashed the criminal proceedings.
Those decisions do not apply to the fact situation of the
present case.

9.

The

High

Court

has

hypertechnical approach and

adopted

strictly

such an endeavour may

be justified during a trial, but certainly not during the

stage of investigation. At any rate it is too premature a
stage for the High Court to step in and stall the
investigation by declaring that it is a civil transaction
wherein no semblance of criminal offence is involved.

10. The appellant, is therefore right in contending that

the First Information Report should not have been

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quashed in this case and the investigation should have

been allowed to proceed.

11. We, therefore, allow this appeal and set aside the
impugned order.

.J.
(T.S. Thakur)

J.
(C. Nagappan)
New Delhi;
May 9, 2014

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